The Ultimate Guide : How to Increase Website Traffic

Hi There, we hope you enjoyed reading our previous post on the top 10 WordPress SEO strategies that’ll help boost your site’s performance. Today, in this post, we’ll take a look at the best methods to increase website traffic. So, let’s get started.

In this modern world so dominated by the internet, website traffic is now a very expensive commodity. It is sought after by virtually every website owner and is widely regarded as the biggest measurement of a website’s success.

So, no wonder a lot of us are obsessed with increasing traffic, which is a good thing. And with the demands, there are countless articles and guides discussing tricks, methods, and ‘secret recipes’ to increase traffic.

Yet, sometimes rather than being helpful, those guides rather confuse us with all the different methods and strategies.

Which ones are still working as we are approaching 2018? Should I focus on just one method or several at once? Why do I end up losing money even after my traffic has increased? Those are just a few questions among many others that might arise when we are discussing traffic.

So, instead of adding to your confusion, this guide will attempt to compile all the working methods and answering all your questions. Let us begin this Ultimate Guide To Website Traffic with a brief discussion of the concept.

Before We Begin

Not all website traffics are created equally. That is the first principle you should understand. Why? Because as with most of anything else in the world, you will need to spend your money to get your traffic. So, there will be traffic that is profitable, and some others that are not.

Is non-profiting traffic always bad? Not necessarily. Sometimes, they can have an indirect benefit to your business. A simple example is, a non-converting visitor might not bring any direct benefit to your business. However, there’s a chance that the visitor can recommend your site to a friend that needs it, giving you an indirect benefit as an advocate.

Nevertheless, this guide will focus on increasing profitable traffic. So, what are the possible methods to increase profitable website traffic? We will answer this in the next section.

Your Potential Traffic Generation Methods

As mentioned, there are a lot of, if not countless potential methods available to increase website traffic. So, as promised, here we will compile some of the most effective methods available or the focus of this guide. They are:

1.Leveraging Content

2.Social Media

3.SEO

4.Maximizing Influencer Marketing

5.Paid Traffic

6.Miscellaneous Tactics

For the rest of this guide, we will focus on discussing each of these methods one by one. Let us begin with the first one.

1. Increasing Website Traffic Through Leveraging Content

Most online businesses nowadays are content-driven in one way or another. That’s not a surprise, considering how content is indeed king nowadays. Content can come in many forms, from your usual blog posts to product or service promotions, to videos.

However, many businesses completely focus on the creation aspect of content. Disregarding the fact, that distribution of the content also matters as much, if not more than the quality of your content. So, here we will learn how to leverage your content to increase website traffic.

There are countless ways to leverage content, and here are a few ideas to get you started:

Video: Even if your content it word-based, you can record an audio over it and turn it into a video presentation. How should you leverage your video? This very nice guide by Entrepreneur.com might help you.

Podcast: Again, record your posts as an audio file and start podcasting. Even as we are approaching 2018 podcast is still a very powerful medium.

Leveraging Articles: If your content is mostly short posts, consider making them as a full article instead. Make useful ultimate guides, in-depth articles, and white paper, depending on your niche.

Images: Infographics and useful images are always sought-after and have a high chance of going viral. Leverage them through Instagram and Pinterest among others.

Webinars: Also a powerful platform. This guide by GoToMeeting can help you get started. Also, stay tuned for our own guide to the webinar in the near future.

There are many other ways to leverage your content for more traffic, only limited by your imagination. In short, every time you develop a content, always think of the potential to turn it into more traffic.

There are several benefits to content leverage besides traffic, such as:

Saving time and money, as you can ‘recycle’ your contents to work for you.

2. Increasing Website Traffic Through Social Media

Leveraging social media to gain traffic is pretty versatile and you can use it for both short-term and long-term gains. It is a powerful method when you need a quick traffic increase, yet can also help you nurture long-term relationships. So, this method works well in conjunction with influencer marketing, which we will discuss below.

So, how can we use social media as traffic stream? The principle is very simple: post high-quality and engaging content regularly and include a link to your site. Besides the obvious social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, you can also use active forums and community websites related to your industry.

3. Increasing Website Traffic Through SEO

SEO is definitely one of the most effective ways to get traffic, with search engines becoming the center of our lives nowadays.

However, as Mike mentioned in his step-by-step guide, SEO is a long-term strategy and it might take more than 8 months until you notice any results and traffic increase. So, optimizing for search engines shouldn’t be your only strategy if you are looking for a quick traffic increase.

Still, if you are planning to have a long-lasting, flourishing business, definitely invest in SEO.

4. Increasing Website Traffic Through Influencer Marketing

Influencers are now the rock-stars of digital marketing and are a very valuable commodity to get more traffic. Yet, targeting influencers is easier said than done, and here we will discuss how to do it properly.

The key, however, is understanding that using influencers as traffic stream requires the long-term commitment. You will need some time and skill to build relationships. Depending on your niche, your influencers can be influential bloggers, YouTubers, high-profile social media accounts, or even your industry leaders.

There are three major ways to use influencers as your traffic stream:

Getting more shares because of the influencers’ exposure.

Being mentioned on other blogs, sites, or social media.

Being linked by other sites. (more SEO-related, but can be included here)

5. Increasing Website Traffic Through Paid Stream

Generally, we will want to leverage free traffic generation methods as much as possible. However, the more competitive your industry is, the more you will need to invest in paid traffic streams. Why? Because everybody else is.

Paid streams will always guarantee short-term traffic increase if you do it properly. However, as we have mentioned, you might end up losing money if you are not careful.

The key to success here is maintaining the right balance between your budget and your desired goals. Also, analyse how your closest competitors are spending for paid traffic. Our guide for competitive analysis might help you in this aspect.(link)

6. Miscellaneous Tactics

Besides the major traffic streams we have discussed above, there are several miscellaneous methods you might want to try:

If your business is mostly local, you can try doing offline promotions for your website, such as flyer, brochures, etc. Local SEO is also a good idea.

Simply improving your own website might help with traffic. Improve your load speed and make sure your site is mobile-responsive. If your website is powered by WordPress, then check out these expert tips on how to speed up your WordPress site.

You can create ‘products’ such as affiliate programs, special offers, etc. specifically to increase traffic.

Another way to increase traffic is to create an action-oriented email marketing campaign.

CONCLUSION

With so many available traffic strategies to choose from, it is easy to get overwhelmed pretty fast. So, instead of focusing on several strategies at once, our advice is to focus on just two: one that is effective in a short-term basis such as social media, and another for long-term, like SEO.

Of course, your strategic choices will depend on your industry or niche. The easiest way to figure out the right strategy is arguably, to see what your competitors are doing. Do your competitive analysis homework, assess their current strategies, and act accordingly.

Mike Khorev is an SEO expert and digital marketing strategist that helps small and mid-size businesses generate more leads and sales and grow revenue online. He offers expert advice on marketing your company the right way through performance-based digital marketing, web design, social media, search engine marketing and many other online practices.

Emails are still considered as one of the most powerful marketing strategies that can help you grow your business. It’s t...

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